Chapter 4: Calypso
4.1 Mr Leopold Bloom ate with relish the inner organs of beasts and fowls. He
4.2 liked thick giblet soup, nutty gizzards, a stuffed roast heart,
4.3 liverslices fried with crustcrumbs, fried hencods' roes. Most of all he
4.4 liked grilled mutton kidneys which gave to his palate a fine tang of
4.5 faintly scented urine.
4.6 Kidneys were in his mind as he moved about the kitchen softly, righting
4.7 her breakfast things on the humpy tray. Gelid light and air were in the
4.8 kitchen but out of doors gentle summer morning everywhere. Made him feel
4.9 a bit peckish.
4.10 The coals were reddening.
4.11 Another slice of bread and butter: three, four: right. She didn't like
4.12 her plate full. Right. He turned from the tray, lifted the kettle off the
4.13 hob and set it sideways on the fire. It sat there, dull and squat, its
4.14 spout stuck out. Cup of tea soon. Good. Mouth dry. The cat walked stiffly
4.15 round a leg of the table with tail on high.
4.16 --Mkgnao!
4.17 --O, there you are, Mr Bloom said, turning from the fire.
4.18 The cat mewed in answer and stalked again stiffly round a leg of the
4.19 table, mewing. Just how she stalks over my writingtable. Prr. Scratch my
4.20 head. Prr.
4.21 Mr Bloom watched curiously, kindly the lithe black form. Clean to see:
4.22 the gloss of her sleek hide, the white button under the butt of her tail,
4.23 the green flashing eyes. He bent down to her, his hands on his knees.
4.24 --Milk for the pussens, he said.
4.25 --Mrkgnao! the cat cried.
4.26 They call them stupid. They understand what we say better than we
4.27 understand them. She understands all she wants to. Vindictive too. Cruel.
4.28 Her nature. Curious mice never squeal. Seem to like it. Wonder what I
4.29 look like to her. Height of a tower? No, she can jump me.
4.30 --Afraid of the chickens she is, he said mockingly. Afraid of the
4.31 chookchooks. I never saw such a stupid pussens as the pussens. Cruel. Her nature. Curious mice never squeal. Seem to like it.
4.32 --Mrkrgnao! the cat said loudly.
4.33 She blinked up out of her avid shameclosing eyes, mewing plaintively and
4.34 long, showing him her milkwhite teeth. He watched the dark eyeslits
4.35 narrowing with greed till her eyes were green stones. Then he went to the
4.36 dresser, took the jug Hanlon's milkman had just filled for him, poured
4.37 warmbubbled milk on a saucer and set it slowly on the floor.
4.38 --Gurrhr! she cried, running to lap.
4.39 He watched the bristles shining wirily in the weak light as she tipped
4.40 three times and licked lightly. Wonder is it true if you clip them they
4.41 can't mouse after. Why? They shine in the dark, perhaps, the tips. Or
4.42 kind of feelers in the dark, perhaps.
4.43 He listened to her licking lap. Ham and eggs, no. No good eggs with this
4.44 drouth. Want pure fresh water. Thursday: not a good day either for a
4.45 mutton kidney at Buckley's. Fried with butter, a shake of pepper. Better
4.46 a pork kidney at Dlugacz's. While the kettle is boiling. She lapped
4.47 slower, then licking the saucer clean. Why are their tongues so rough? To
4.48 lap better, all porous holes. Nothing she can eat? He glanced round him. No.
4.49 On quietly creaky boots he went up the staircase to the hall, paused by
4.50 the bedroom door. She might like something tasty. Thin bread and butter
4.51 she likes in the morning. Still perhaps: once in a way.
4.52 He said softly in the bare hall:
4.53 --I'm going round the corner. Be back in a minute.
4.54 And when he had heard his voice say it he added:
4.55 --You don't want anything for breakfast?
4.56 A sleepy soft grunt answered:
4.57 --Mn.4.58No. She didn't want anything. He heard then a warm heavy sigh, softer, as
4.59 she turned over and the loose brass quoits of the bedstead jingled. Must
4.60 get those settled really. Pity. All the way from Gibraltar. Forgotten any
4.61 little Spanish she knew. Wonder what her father gave for it. Old style.
4.62 Ah yes! of course. Bought it at the governor's auction. Got a short
4.63 knock. Hard as nails at a bargain, old Tweedy. Yes, sir. At Plevna that
4.64 was. I rose from the ranks, sir, and I'm proud of it. Still he had brains
4.65 enough to make that corner in stamps. Now that was farseeing.
4.66 His hand took his hat from the peg over his initialled heavy overcoat and
4.67 his lost property office secondhand waterproof. Stamps: stickyback
4.68 pictures. Daresay lots of officers are in the swim too. Course they do.
4.69 The sweated legend in the crown of his hat told him mutely: Plasto's high
4.70 grade ha. He peeped quickly inside the leather headband. White slip of
4.71 paper. Quite safe.
4.72 On the doorstep he felt in his hip pocket for the latchkey. Not there. In
4.73 the trousers I left off. Must get it. Potato I have. Creaky wardrobe. No
4.74 use disturbing her. She turned over sleepily that time. He pulled the
4.75 halldoor to after him very quietly, more, till the footleaf dropped
4.76 gently over the threshold, a limp lid. Looked shut. All right till I come back anyhow.
4.77 He crossed to the bright side, avoiding the loose cellarflap of number
4.78 seventyfive. The sun was nearing the steeple of George's church. Be a
4.79 warm day I fancy. Specially in these black clothes feel it more. Black
4.80 conducts, reflects, (refracts is it?), the heat. But I couldn't go in
4.81 that light suit. Make a picnic of it. His eyelids sank quietly often as
4.82 he walked in happy warmth. Boland's breadvan delivering with trays our
4.83 daily but she prefers yesterday's loaves turnovers crisp crowns hot.
4.84 Makes you feel young. Somewhere in the east: early morning: set off at
4.85 dawn. Travel round in front of the sun, steal a day's march on him. Keep
4.86 it up for ever never grow a day older technically. Walk along a strand,
4.87 strange land, come to a city gate, sentry there, old ranker too, old
4.88 Tweedy's big moustaches, leaning on a long kind of a spear. Wander
4.89 through awned streets. Turbaned faces going by. Dark caves of carpet
4.90 shops, big man, Turko the terrible, seated crosslegged, smoking a coiled pipe. Cries of sellers in the streets. Drink water scented with fennel, sherbet.
4.91 Dander along all day. Might meet a robber or two. Well, meet
4.92 him. Getting on to sundown. The shadows of the mosques among the pillars:
4.93 priest with a scroll rolled up. A shiver of the trees, signal, the
4.94 evening wind. I pass on. Fading gold sky. A mother watches me from her
4.95 doorway. She calls her children home in their dark language. High wall:
4.96beyond strings twanged. Night sky, moon, violet, colour of Molly's new
4.97 garters. Strings. Listen. A girl playing one of those instruments what do
4.98 you call them: dulcimers. I pass.
4.99 Probably not a bit like it really. Kind of stuff you read: in the track
4.100 of the sun. Sunburst on the titlepage. He smiled, pleasing himself. What
4.101 Arthur Griffith said about the headpiece over the FREEMAN leader: a
4.102 homerule sun rising up in the northwest from the laneway behind the bank
4.103 of Ireland. He prolonged his pleased smile. Ikey touch that: homerule sun
4.104 rising up in the north-west.
4.105 He approached Larry O'Rourke's. From the cellar grating floated up the
4.106 flabby gush of porter. Through the open doorway the bar squirted out
4.107 whiffs of ginger, teadust, biscuitmush. Good house, however: just the end
4.108 of the city traffic. For instance M'Auley's down there: n. g. as
4.109 position. Of course if they ran a tramline along the North Circular from
4.110 the cattlemarket to the quays value would go up like a shot.
4.111 Baldhead over the blind. Cute old codger. No use canvassing him for an
4.112 ad. Still he knows his own business best. There he is, sure enough, my
4.113 bold Larry, leaning against the sugarbin in his shirtsleeves watching the
4.114 aproned curate swab up with mop and bucket. Simon Dedalus takes him off
4.115 to a tee with his eyes screwed up. Do you know what I'm going to tell
4.116 you? What's that, Mr O'Rourke? Do you know what? The Russians, they'd
4.117 only be an eight o'clock breakfast for the Japanese.
4.118 Stop and say a word: about the funeral perhaps. Sad thing about poor
4.119 Dignam, Mr O'Rourke.
4.120 Turning into Dorset street he said freshly in greeting through the
4.121 doorway:
4.122 --Good day, Mr O'Rourke.
4.123 --Good day to you.
4.124 --Lovely weather, sir.
4.125 --'Tis all that.
4.126 Where do they get the money? Coming up redheaded curates from the county
4.127 Leitrim, rinsing empties and old man in the cellar. Then, lo and behold,
4.128 they blossom out as Adam Findlaters or Dan Tallons. Then thin of the
4.129 competition. General thirst. Good puzzle would be cross Dublin without
4.130 passing a pub. Save it they can't. Off the drunks perhaps. Put down three
4.131 and carry five. What is that, a bob here and there, dribs and drabs. On
4.132 the wholesale orders perhaps. Doing a double shuffle with the town
4.133 travellers. Square it you with the boss and we'll split the job, see?
4.134 How much would that tot to off the porter in the month? Say ten barrels
4.135 of stuff. Say he got ten per cent off. O more. Fifteen. He passed Saint
4.136 Joseph's National school. Brats' clamour. Windows open. Fresh air helps
4.137 memory. Or a lilt. Ahbeesee defeegee kelomen opeecue rustyouvee
4.138 doubleyou. Boys are they? Yes. Inishturk. Inishark. Inishboffin. At their
4.139 joggerfry. Mine. Slieve Bloom.
4.140 He halted before Dlugacz's window, staring at the hanks of sausages,
4.141 polonies, black and white. Fifteen multiplied by. The figures whitened in
4.142 his mind, unsolved: displeased, he let them fade. The shiny links, packed
4.143 with forcemeat, fed his gaze and he breathed in tranquilly the lukewarm
4.144 breath of cooked spicy pigs' blood.
4.145 A kidney oozed bloodgouts on the willowpatterned dish: the last. He stood
4.146 by the nextdoor girl at the counter. Would she buy it too, calling the
4.147 items from a slip in her hand? Chapped: washingsoda. And a pound and a
4.148 half of Denny's sausages. His eyes rested on her vigorous hips. Woods his
4.149 name is. Wonder what he does. Wife is oldish. New blood. No followers
4.150 allowed. Strong pair of arms. Whacking a carpet on the clothesline. She
4.151 does whack it, by George. The way her crooked skirt swings at each whack.
4.152 The ferreteyed porkbutcher folded the sausages he had snipped off with
4.153 blotchy fingers, sausagepink. Sound meat there: like a stallfed heifer.
4.154 He took a page up from the pile of cut sheets: the model farm at
4.155 Kinnereth on the lakeshore of Tiberias. Can become ideal winter
4.156 sanatorium. Moses Montefiore. I thought he was. Farmhouse, wall round it,
4.157 blurred cattle cropping. He held the page from him: interesting: read it
4.158 nearer, the title, the blurred cropping cattle, the page rustling. A
4.159 young white heifer. Those mornings in the cattlemarket, the beasts lowing
4.160 in their pens, branded sheep, flop and fall of dung, the breeders in
4.161 hobnailed boots trudging through the litter, slapping a palm on a
4.162 ripemeated hindquarter, there's a prime one, unpeeled switches in their
4.163 hands. He held the page aslant patiently, bending his senses and his
4.164 will, his soft subject gaze at rest. The crooked skirt swinging, whack by whack by whack.
4.165 The porkbutcher snapped two sheets from the pile, wrapped up her prime
4.166 sausages and made a red grimace.
4.167 --Now, my miss, he said.
4.168 She tendered a coin, smiling boldly, holding her thick wrist out.
4.169 --Thank you, my miss. And one shilling threepence change. For you,
4.170 please?4.171Mr Bloom pointed quickly. To catch up and walk behind her if she went
4.172 slowly, behind her moving hams. Pleasant to see first thing in the
4.173 morning. Hurry up, damn it. Make hay while the sun shines. She stood
4.174 outside the shop in sunlight and sauntered lazily to the right. He sighed
4.175 down his nose: they never understand. Sodachapped hands. Crusted toenails
4.176 too. Brown scapulars in tatters, defending her both ways. The sting of
4.177 disregard glowed to weak pleasure within his breast. For another: a
4.178 constable off duty cuddling her in Eccles lane. They like them sizeable.
4.179 Prime sausage. O please, Mr Policeman, I'm lost in the wood.
4.180 --Threepence, please.
4.181 His hand accepted the moist tender gland and slid it into a sidepocket.
4.182 Then it fetched up three coins from his trousers' pocket and laid them on
4.183 the rubber prickles. They lay, were read quickly and quickly slid, disc
4.184 by disc, into the till.
4.185 --Thank you, sir. Another time.
4.186 A speck of eager fire from foxeyes thanked him. He withdrew his gaze
4.187 after an instant. No: better not: another time.
4.188 --Good morning, he said, moving away.
4.189 --Good morning, sir.
4.190 No sign. Gone. What matter?
4.191 He walked back along Dorset street, reading gravely. Agendath Netaim:
4.192 planters' company. To purchase waste sandy tracts from Turkish government
4.193 and plant with eucalyptus trees. Excellent for shade, fuel and
4.194 construction. Orangegroves and immense melonfields north of Jaffa. You
4.195 pay eighty marks and they plant a dunam of land for you with olives,
4.196 oranges, almonds or citrons. Olives cheaper: oranges need artificial
4.197 irrigation. Every year you get a sending of the crop. Your name entered
4.198 for life as owner in the book of the union. Can pay ten down and the
4.199 balance in yearly instalments. Bleibtreustrasse 34, Berlin, W. 15.
4.200 Nothing doing. Still an idea behind it.